Edgesensedashboard

Interactive tutorial

Welcome to the Edgesense interactive tutorial. Imagine you are a moderator of this community (maybe you are!). We will ask you five questions, each addressing a concrete problem that you, as administrator, might have. Below the question you will find a hint, that contains information about how to use the EdgeSense interface to answer the question. The tutorial's purpose is to learn how to interpret social network analytics.

After each question we ask you to rate the usefulness of the features you have been using. The data from the survey are recorded in anonymous form, and we only use them to improve Edgesense.

Look at your community's network of relationship and click on a highly central node. The more central the better!

Click on the lock to zoom and move the network; hover over nodes to discover their degree and centrality metrics. Click on the ? icon to learn more about the meaning of these metrics.

As you have seen, Edgesense lets you discover how central each individual user is in the conversation. How useful do you think this is?

What percentage of all relationships occurring on your community do you think involve moderators? (Relationships, represented by edges in the graph, occur when a user comments another user.)

less than 20%

between 20 and 40%

between 40 and 60%

between 60 and 80%

more than 80%

Check/uncheck the "Moderators?" box to show/hide moderators and all edges incident to them. What do you see? The green frame on the right shows how relationships grow over time.

As you have seen, Edgesense lets you investigate the role of moderators in the conversation. How useful do you think this is?

In the latest period for which we have data, how self-sustaining is your community (excluding the contribution of moderators)? Consider only posts, not comments, in your answer.

In the latest period, users in your community, moderators excluded, have contributed

less than 20% of all posts

between 20 and 40% of all posts

between 40 and 60% of all posts

between 60 and 80% of all posts

more than 80% of all posts

Look below the graph for the three line charts; click on the ? icon of each of them to learn more about their meaning. Kinks in the curves represent periods: the last period for which we have data is represented by the very last segment of the curve.

As you have seen, Edgesense lets you measure how much moderators contribute to your community's activity. How useful do you think this is?

Over the last period, has the share of comments written by non-moderators increased or decreased?

It has increased: the conversation has become more sustainable.

It has decreased: the conversation has become more sustainable.

It has increased: the conversation has become less sustainable.

It has decreased: the conversation has become less sustainable.

The three line charts at the bottom of the page are divided into 50 datapoints. Look at what happened over the rightmost. Is the line representing the share of comments going up or down? Click on the ? icon on the chart to learn more about its interpretation.

As you have seen, Edgesense lets you discover how self-sustaining the conversation has become. How useful do you think this is?

Network modularity is higher when a network can be divided quite naturally into subcommunities of nodes that are more connected to other nodes in the same subcommunity than to nodes in other subcommunities. Does the presence of moderators increase or decrease modularity in your network?

Moderators increase modularity, because they talk mostly to each other

Moderators increase modularity, because they tend to talk with very many different people in the network.

Moderators reduce modularity, because they talk mostly to each other

Moderators reduce modularity, because they tend to talk with very many different people in the network.

Check/uncheck the "Moderators?" box to show/hide moderators, and look at what happens to the network's modularity (in the purple frame on the right).

As you have seen, Edgesense lets you discover and explore the subcommunities emerging from the conversation. How useful do you think this is?

You have gotten answers out of 5 right. Congratulations, and thank you for using this tutorial.

Please leave a message to the Edgesense development team. It could be feedback, request for more features, or just saying hi. You can write in any language, we'll manage.